10 "Must Use" Websites For Your Job Search!!!

There is a wealth of job search tools available out there to help you in your quest. What are some of the most useful resources?


1) LinkedIn

LinkedIn is by far, in my opinion, the most important and most powerful tool on the web for your job search. It is THE place to see and be seen. Posting your profile is terrific to “be found”, but even greater value for a job seeker comes in the ability to search for contacts at companies, learn about companies, learn about a contact prior to a phone call or interview, and find potential “hidden” contacts through references on other people’s profiles. I’ve written more about LinkedIn here.

Another great resource for LinkedIn is Jason Alba’s book: I'm on LinkedIn--Now What???



2) Google

Everyone knows Google is priceless in finding anything online. Used creatively, Google is also priceless in finding information you might not otherwise think of! LinkedIn is FULL of valuable contacts for you, but if you’re just starting out and only have 15 connections, you’re not getting the vast majority of contacts you want from your search in LinkedIn. Through Google you can find ALL the public profiles on LinkedIn! (i.e. if you’re a sales person, looking for a Sales Manager to contact in the Minneapolis area, you might do a search like: site:www.linkedin.com “Sales Manager” "Greater Minneapolis-St. Paul Area" -NOT Directory ) You’ll be amazed at the results.

Say you find a contact name on LinkedIn, or through other networking, use Google to find their contact information. First, try simply searching their name in quotes to see what you find. If you get too many results, narrow it down. If you know the domain of their company, you know the last part of their email is @companyname.com so search: “firstname lastname” “@companyname.com”

These don’t always work, but I succeed at least half the time. Get creative, you “have the whole world in your hands!”


3) Data.com Connect

Learn, contribute, and use Data.com! This is an extremely powerful tool to find contact information. Data.com is probably the worlds largest “Rolodex”. You can either “Play” by adding your own contacts and gaining points, or “Pay” by purchasing points to gain contacts. I always prefer FREE, so find all the business cards you have and start entering the information! They have the business card information of millions of people and if you can’t find a phone number or email address through other contacts or Google… THIS is the place to go!


4) JibberJobber

Keeping your contacts, job postings you’re interested in, schedule, record of connections, and everything else in your search organized can be a colossal headache! JibberJobber is a tremendous tool to keep it all together in one place. Another Jason Alba creation, it’s highly useful for free, but even more powerful with some of the premium services. This is a great tool if you’re having trouble with keeping track of everything!


5-6) SimplyHired and Indeed

Searching all the job boards out there can be overwhelming and extremely time consuming. SimplyHired and Indeed are consolidation sites that scour all the major (Monster, HotJobs, CareerBuilder) and many minor and specialized job boards to bring all the results together for you into one place. They each allow you to set up automated searches as well. They are terrific timesavers!


7) Linkup

Similar to SimplyHired and Indeed, LinkUp.com consolidates results for you, but instead of scouring job boards, it scours company websites to produce results that may not be listed anywhere else. It’s a great resource to find opportunities that you might otherwise never see.


8) Jobscan

Jobscan gives you a great chance to “test” your resume to see how it might fare in the applicant tracking system of a company when you’re applying online. Your resume is only likely to be seen by human eyeballs if it matches the job description well enough to be picked up by the system for further review by a recruiter or hiring manager. Jobscan gives you the ability to load the job description as well as your resume and it reports on the strength of the match. Give it a try!


9) Twitter

Twitter can be the biggest time waster and most productive real-time asset in your job search all wrapped into one. It’s fun, it’s fast, it’s chaotic, and has an unbelievable wealth of information for you. It’s ability to give you access to people, leads, ideas, and information is unmatched, but you have to be very strategic and deliberate in how you use it. I wrote some helpful ideas for you here. Learn it and use it… you may be amazed at what you find!


10) The Wise Job Search

I’d be remiss (and a poor self-promoter) if I didn’t encourage you to keep reading the other articles posted here. I believe good practical advice is hard to find sometimes, I hope this site helps!
(OK, it might not be one of the 10 most important sites out there, but it’s my site and my list!)


There are obviously many more excellent resources available on the web, and I’ll be highlighting more of them later. However, these are tremendous places to jump-start and manage an effective job search!

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